December 23, 2008 Gainesville Sun
Florida's inmates will soon have a new chef in the kitchen. By the second week of January, all food served in state prisons will be prepared by state employees and inmates. The Department of Corrections is taking over in the kitchen after its two contracted providers, Trinity Food Services and Aramark Correctional Services, terminated their contracts to feed inmates. Both providers have told prison officials that inflation, especially rapidly rising food costs, was a primary factor in their decisions to end their contracts. The department is taking over at a time when the inmate population is growing significantly and the Legislature is cutting expenditures. The 2008 state Legislature cut the department's 2008-2009 food appropriation by $9.25 million to $76.5 million. When the Legislature met in the spring, the inmate population was estimated at nearly 89,000, but earlier this month topped 100,000 for the first time in state history. Prison contracts show Trinity pulled out of the prisons it was serving in November and Aramark will be out of all the prisons it has been serving by Jan. 12. Since beginning to assume control of the prison kitchens, the department has contracted with U.S. Food Services to provide food.

November 13, 2008 Palm Beach Post
A seven-year privatization effort for prison food services is officially over as the state begins taking over meal preparation in some prisons today. But Florida prison officials are unable to pinpoint exactly how much serving nearly 100,000 inmates will save taxpayers, or if it will at all. "We don't have a number right now," Department of Corrections spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said this week. Corrections officials were ordered by the legislature this year to trim more than $9.2 million from their annual $83.9 million food services budget by cutting back on calories, changing the meal plan and allowing the two vendors to reduce staff. But prison officials were reluctant to implement reductions because they feared it could lead to inmate uprisings and endanger guards. After rebidding the food services contract and issuing an invitation to bid on just food, the department settled on a $77.2 million contract with U.S. Food Services to supply the food and take over cooking the meals and cleaning up in-house. Lawmakers have been looking for places to trim the state budget all year with as much as $3 billion less in revenue than expected. They could meet as early as next month for another cost-cutting session. "The days of 'trust me' and ask the legislature to just sign off on things are over. People are going to have to justify every cent that the public provides. If it saves money, I'm all for it. But everything's going to have to be proven," said Sen. Alex Villalobos, R-Miami, who served on the Senate Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Committee and was appointed Rules Chairman Thursday. Vendors Trinity Food Services and Aramark said they could not cut costs without changing the menu, something else prison officials were reluctant to do because studies show that meal changes create disturbances in prisons. Both Vendors Trinity Food Services and Aramark vendors gave notice this year sent letters to the department earlier this year giving officials notice that they were going to walk away from the contracts. DOC this summer reissued a bid food services and another for food products only. The cheapest bid for food services came from Philadelphia-based Aramark for $96.1 million, Plessinger said, nearly $21.5 million more than their revised budget allows. "We're looking at all of those numbers and we do believe it will come in under $96.1 million," Plessinger said of the new contract. Since signing a contract with the state seven years ago, Aramark has received mixed reviews. There have been questions about food quality, quantity and potential health violations. At times, the company has been fined by the state for failure to meet the specifications of its contract. The company now faces fines of more than $300,000 for violations. Trinity, which serves the region of the state from Madison to Flagler counties, will cease serving food today. Aramark will gradually withdraw from the rest of the state and will be out of the state's prison food business by mid-January. Taking back food operations is "quite unprecedented for a department of corrections," Aramark spokeswoman Sarah Jarvis said. Prison officials they can cut the food price by altering the menu and making other cost savings quickly, Plessinger said. The department will realize 100 percent of the savings by changing the menu to cheaper items instead of splitting that with the vendors, she said. The plan includes having inmates grow more of their own food and training them as cooks, Plessinger said, part of DOC's efforts to prepare inmates for release. "We think this is going to be a win for everybody. First and foremost for Florida taxpayers because this is the best way for us to cut our food budget. It's also a win for our inmates because it's going to expand training programs for them," Plessinger said, while maintaining prison safety.

Fulton County Jail, Fulton, Georgia
July 18, 2007 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Fulton County can't seem to resolve a $4 million deal to provide food service to county jail inmates, a contract marked by allegations of corruption and employee misconduct. The board failed to end the controversy again Wednesday with a deadlocked 3-3 vote on a proposal to keep the current company, Trinity Services Group, for another year. Commissioners, who have discussed the deal at length half a dozen times in the past several months, didn't bother Wednesday. They simply took the latest vote with no discussion. The deal has gone through several attempts to bid and rebid with three main groups seeking the work all being ranked No. 1 at different times. The controversy has generated bid complaints and lawsuits from spurned bidders that continue. Evaluators recommended Trinity in the latest round of bids completed June 15 over teams from Gourmet/Aramark and Meat Masters. Meat Masters has filed suit challenging the bids and the process and seeking award of the deal. The company's lawyer, Charles Mathis, accused county staff of improperly manipulating bid results to keep Meat Masters from winning the bid. County attorney O.V. Brantley said he looked into the allegations but found no reason to call in criminal investigators. The third bidder, Gourmet-Aramark Correctional Services, also says it was cheated out of the contract. The company filed a formal bid protest with the county. The firm also alleged collusion involving the other two bidders because Meat Masters filed a bid but also was included as a subcontractor on the winning bid by Trinity.

March 22, 2007 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Fulton County will take a step back and ask more companies to bid on a contract to feed inmates at the Fulton County Jail. Fulton's County Commission voted unanimously Wednesday for a 90-day deferral on a vote to hire a food service provider for the jail and satellite facilities. County purchasing officials are to use the delay to advertise the contract in national publications that cater to the corrections industry. Commissioners weren't pleased by a staff recommendation to hire Gourmet-ARAMARK Correctional Services, which the county fired two years ago. Some commissioners drilled into the county's purchasing guidelines because they give a big bonus to companies that have an office in Fulton County. Commissioner Robb Pitts said Gourmet-ARAMARK would have won the contract even if all three bidders had scored the same in every category but one — location. For the sole reason that it was the only company with a physical address in Fulton County, the company outscored its competition and won the staff's recommendation, Pitts said. Chairman John Eaves said he didn't understand why Gourmet-ARAMARK got the nod when its $4 million bid was the highest of the three that were submitted. It was about $1 million higher than the low bidder. Eaves made the motion to defer the vote. Felicia Strong-Whitaker, a deputy director of the county's purchasing department, said the county's purchasing guidelines state that cost makes up 25 points of the formula used to recommend a company for this type of contract. A company gets an automatic 10 points if it has an office in Fulton County, she said.

February 21, 2007 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Amid allegations of bid rigging and corruption, Fulton County commissioners agreed Wednesday to rebid a lucrative food service contract at the county jail. County Attorney O.V. Brantley said Wednesday she's launched a probe into the allegations, but Commissioner Robb Pitts said any investigation should be turned over to state or federal agents. "Someone seems hell bent on giving the contract to this firm," Pitts said. "I'm going to find out why.... This is serious stuff...This needs to be investigated, not in house but by someone outside." The Trinity Services Group won the original contract in 2005, but it expired more than a year ago. When it was rebid in December, Trinity received the recommendation, even though it was the highest bidder of the three, according to county records. One of the firms that was rejected filed a formal protest with the county, and the other filed a letter, also with the county, claiming employees were pressured to change bid evaluations to ensure that the deal stayed with Trinity. Charles Mathis Jr. said his client, Meat Masters Inc., was the rightful winner of the contract with a bid that was $850,000 lower than Trinity's $4.1 million offer. They only failed, Mathis said in his letter, because county employees were pressured to doctor the bid evaluations. "Meat Masters should legitimately be awarded the contract," Mathis wrote. Two county employees, Sgt. Chandra Hall and former Chief Jailer Charles Felton, provided written statements to Meat Masters that they had been directed to change the contract evaluations to boost the results for Trinity. The Board of Commissioners has copies of the letters, which were also obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Both said they were threatened that if they went before commissioners with Meat Masters as the bidder they would be hammered. The other bidder, Gourmet-Aramark Correctional Services, has alleged collusion involving the other two bidders since Meat Masters was included as a subcontractor on the winning bid by Trinity. Lawyer Michael Coleman, who served as hearing officer for the complaint, issued a ruling on Feb. 16 that recommended Fulton rebid the deal. "Due to the questions raised by the county's rejection of Gourmet-ARAMARK's proposal and the collusion claims involving Trinity and Meat Masters, the appropriate remedy is to cancel the current RFP and re-issue a new RFP," Coleman found.